In Sweet Paprika Mirka Andolfo retains the sensuality of UnNatural, but replaces its dystopian fantasy with a story about sex, work, self-image and relationships. Set in New York, it centres on Paprika, a successful young businesswoman of Italian origin whose professional life has consumed almost everything else. Confident, ambitious and intimidating at work, she is much less assured in her private life, where a combination of a strict upbringing and an absence of romantic and sexual experience has left her isolated.

Her life is disrupted by Dill, an attractive and rather naive angel whose relaxed, uncomplicated manner is almost the opposite of her own. Their unlikely relationship provides the basis for a serious comedy about desire and self-discovery, but Andolfo is interested in more than the mechanics of an unconventional romance. Paprika has to reconsider the assumptions about sex, femininity and success that have shaped her life, while learning to distinguish between the person she thinks she ought to be and what she actually wants.

The eroticism is integral to the story. Andolfo’s stylised figures, expressive faces and attention to bodies, clothing and gesture give its sexual encounters and fantasies a playful visual energy. The character of Paprika originated in a series of erotic illustrations that Andolfo posted online, where she attracted a substantial following before developing the character into a comic. Andolfo has said that when she draws erotic material she tries to create characters who are comfortable exploring their sensuality, or who become more confident in doing so. Paprika’s journey consequently gives the sexual imagery a narrative purpose as well as a visual one.

Hot Paprika presents the same story in a more explicitly sexual form. In the Italian editions published alongside Sweet Paprika in 2021, readers could choose between different levels of explicitness, while later English-language editions incorporated additional and redrawn ‘spicier’ panels by Andolfo herself. Image’s Hot Paprika Omnibus, published in 2024, collects all twelve issues of the series.

The Paprika universe has subsequently expanded beyond Andolfo’s original series. Sweet Paprika: Black, White & Pink introduced further stories and characters, while Sweet Paprika: Open for Business is a five-issue queer romance spin-off written by Steve Orlando and illustrated by Emilio Pilliu. It follows Aubrey Jean, an employee at Paprika’s publishing company, and develops characters introduced in Black, White & Pink. Andolfo remains the creator of the original characters and world, but Open for Business is not her own writer-artist work.

Sweet Paprika was first published in Italy by Star Comics in three volumes, beginning in May 2021. The English-language series, written and drawn by Andolfo, was published by Image Comics in twelve issues from July 2021 to September 2022 and collected in two volumes. Hot Paprika was published in Italy simultaneously with the original series, in editions offering additional explicit material. Image subsequently published the uncensored English edition as the 2024 Hot Paprika Omnibus. The series has also been published in French, and translated editions have appeared in Spain, Argentina, Chile and Turkey.

Here we include the first two chapters of the English-language version of Sweet Paprika.